Biggs's boy was the first to come round. Biggs is our greengrocer, and
his chief talent lies in securing the services of the most abandoned and
unprincipled errand-boys that civilisation has as yet produced. If
anything more than usually villainous in the boy-line crops up in our
neighbourhood, we know that it is Biggs's latest. I was told that, at
the time of the Great Coram Street murder, it was promptly concluded by
our street that Biggs's boy (for that period) was at the bottom of it,
and had he not been able, in reply to the severe cross-examination to
which he was subjected by No. 19, when he called there for orders the
morning after the crime (assisted by No. 21, who happened to be on the
step at the time), to prove a complete ALIBI, it would have gone hard
with him. I didn't know Biggs's boy at that time, but, from what I have
seen of them since, I should not have attached much importance to that
ALIBI myself.
Biggs's boy, as I have said, came round the corner. He was evidently in
a great hurry when he first dawned upon the vision, but, on catching
sight of Harris and me, and Montmorency, and the things, he eased up and
stared. Harris and I frowned at him. This might have wounded a more
sensitive nature, but Biggs's boys are not, as a rule, touchy. He came
to a dead stop, a yard from our step, and, leaning up against the
railings, and selecting a straw to chew, fixed us with his eye. He
evidently meant to see this thing out.
In another moment, the grocer's boy passed on the opposite side of the
street. Biggs's boy hailed him:
"Hi! ground floor o' 42's a-moving."
The grocer's boy came across, and took up a position on the other side of
the step. Then the young gentleman from the boot-shop stopped, and
joined Biggs's boy; while the empty-can superintendent from "The Blue
Posts" took up an independent position on the curb.
"They ain't a-going to starve, are they? " said the gentleman from the
boot-shop.
"Ah! you'd want to take a thing or two with YOU," retorted "The Blue
Posts," "if you was a-going to cross the Atlantic in a small boat."
"They ain't a-going to cross the Atlantic," struck in Biggs's boy;
"they're a-going to find Stanley."
By this time, quite a small crowd had collected, and people were asking
each other what was the matter. One party (the young and giddy portion
of the crowd) held that it was a wedding, and pointed out Harris as the
bridegroom; while the elder and more thoughtful among the populace
inclined to the idea that it was a funeral, and that I was probably the
corpse's brother.
